Eco Worrier - Times Online - WBLG

The weather's grim, so see this at the cinema

Start the day with a smooth espresso? Or do you prefer to hold out until your mid-morning cappuccino? Or what about a latte to lift yourself out of a mid-afternoon lull? Well, whatever form you take your coffee, you should watch Black Gold (see here for more info).
Even if you're suspicious of worthy films, you should see it (click here to find a screening near you). The story involves Ethiopian growers, bean roasters, buyers and sellers, barista competitions and star-struck Starbucks staff; it is fascinating, with or without its ethical punch. So much is coffee part of our caffeine culture, we should at least know how the industry works.
And the injustice within it. The main message is this: in one part of the world, impoverished farmers sell their high quality beans for next to nothing. They barely have enough to feed their families with the low prices that markets dictate. In another, vast profits are made; consumers spend more and more on just the right skinny latte with a twist of caramel, and a luxury industry is developing around the product.

Another garden discovery...

... has been borage. What a word! If I have a son, I shall name him Borage. Actually, that would be too cruel. But it is a funny sort of herb. Mine has bright blue flowers at the moment, star-shaped and so vivid that I would like to press them in a book (not a desire that a healthy twenty-something year old should have). As for what one does with this ere borage, I'm not quite sure. The other day I chopped up some leaves, mixed them with some cream cheese, olive oil and black olives for a dip, slathered this on toasted soda bread, and very tasty it was too.

But there must be more to borage. A quick fumble around the internet yielded the information that it is also known as 'starflower' and is rich in nectar and therefore a good herb to attract wildlife to your garden. A blog here suggests freezing the flowers in an ice tray so that you make pretty cubes for summer drinks. Very hostess-with-the-mostess, I know, but since I've already considered starting a book of pressed flowers, who I am to complain. 

Gobbling greens in the garden - and reds and yellows...

In a fit of enthusiasm and bad planning, I planted far too many nasturtiums when we moved into our flat earlier this year. It was the excitement of having a garden; I went a bit wild, you see. Now they are flattening my beetroot and trying to wind their way around the stakes for the broad beans. I've started ripping off their long limbs, which is a bit mean. Now another solution has unveiled itself. I have discovered something that everyone else has probably known for yonks. Nasturtium leaves and their bright flowers can be eaten - added to a bottle of cider vinegar for a peppery kick or to salads for an unusual ingredient. Here I found a recipe for wrapping up cream cheese in the leaves to accompany an aperitif - to be enjoyed in the garden, of course.

 

Mud and eco activity at Glastonbury

Here at Glastonbury, the main discussion among 180,000 festival goers is the mud. There's always something to say about it. Texture, for instance: at times it's little more than a sloppy cake mixture, mid-calf deep; others it's thick and clingy like soggy sand, hanging to your wellies and slowing you down. But apart from the mud, I'm happy to confirm that the next top topic to infiltrate the site is green not brown.
Glastonbury has always been linked to green matters and social awareness. In the Eighties, it teamed up with CND; more recently, it spawned the famously eco conscious festival The Big Green Gathering. For the past few years, it has made £1 million for charities. This year it's Greenpeace, Water  Aid and Oxfam, all of which have a significant presence across the site. But Glastonbury 2007, more than any other, has seen an almighty green push.

How to be a green rugged man: top ten tips

Ok chaps, so metrosexuality is officially over. No one wants their man nicking their exfoliator or hogging the bathroom, that has been established. What us ladies would prefer in these enlightened times is a green hunk who will lug out the recycling every week, get his hands mucky in the garden and turn the TV and DVD player properly off at night, so that we don’t have to. I’m imagining a sort of Indiana Jones Zac Goldsmith hybrid, mixed with Monty Don’s green fingers and Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall’s kitchen skills. If there’s any room for Kevin Mcloud’s eye for eco-design, I’d be much obliged. Not much to ask for, I’m sure you’ll agree.

This week’s Body&Soul is devoted to the endlessly fascinating subject of men and their peculiar habits – you’ll find it here. With my Eco-Worrier hat on – a manly builders version this week – I address subjects such as mowing the lawn in the greenest possible way and the environmental implications of computer games (find it here). What I didn’t manage to get in was advice on how to be the perfect eco-sensitive man; to woo women with one mention of your organic allotment or unwashed energy-saving wardrobe. Here are my top ten tips:

Yes, please, I’d love one

I rarely lust over cars, give or take the odd converted van that would allow me to indulge in the earthy delights of Off-Grid living (click here to find out about that), but this electric scooter is quite something.
It costs £6,930 and can be driven for up to 68 miles on a two-hour charge from a standard electrical socket. Yes, I know what some will say, your carbon footprint will still be there, just from a power station rather than direct emissions, but so long as you sign up to a green energy tariff first (Good Energy and Ecotricity are my recommendations) you needn’t worry about that. There are already over a dozen places in the UK where you can purchase this snazzy green machine. For a list, contact the nice people at Ventrix.

Do you follow in Grandma’s footsteps?

Recently I bought a beautiful item for the princely sum of 30p. I found it in a second hand shop in a small village in Herefordshire, and I am pleased as punch with it. It is a glass lemon squeezer, a simple device that separates pips from juice, and it has already come in handy countless times. It is going to be a treasured part of my kitchen, I just know it. When I bought it, sliding three ten p's across the counter and feeling astonished that this amount yielded anything at all, something struck me. The lemon squeezer was exactly like the one that my grandmother used and very different from my mothers’ plastic version. She upgraded from glass to plastic in the Seventies when it was considered practical and hygienic. Lightweight and easy to clean, plastic was considered an ideal material for kitchen equipment.
This is not the first time that I notice my habits have skipped a generation, echoing those of my grandmothers. While my mother had no time for growing vegetables - with a job, children and a million of one commitments - my maternal grandmother tended her vegetable patch religiously, producing a glut of beans, peas and tomatoes every summer. She kept chickens for most of her life and not a scrap of carrot peel would go to waste in the house. Other memories of her domestic set-up are less rosy. The corners of her kitchen were not pleasant – a world away from the Jiffed-up, gleaming work surfaces we maintain. Joints of ham would sit for disturbing lengths of time in the larder, and often shrieks would be heard when a Christmas stilton was turned over in February and found to be, literally, crawling.
Maybe I’m dewy-eyed about it all because my grandmother is no longer with me, but I’m sure there is something in my skipped generation theory. Thrifty living, old-fashioned crafts such as crochet and knitting, good old tea and fruitcake, wellies and walks, are all part of the wholesome swing to green living today. I’d love to hear from you if you ever find yourself following in the footsteps of Grandma, or conversely, if you think you’ve picked up more domestic habits from your parents.